March
2002 News
News of other stars from the 1970-71
season
30 March
Luton Town Promoted
Joe
Kinnear's Luton
Town won promotion to Division Two today with a 3-1 away
victory against Swansea City. Luton were relegated last
season and have won promotion at the first attempt. They
still stand a chance of winning the Championship.This was
Luton's 10th straight victory in the League.
BBC SPORT Football Eng Div 3 Swansea 1-3 Luton
N.B. Though Luton took
the winning sequence to 12 wins, drew and won the last
two games of the season after this, the club finished
second to Plymouth Argyle, who won the League with 102
points, a Division Two record !
17 March
Little Out !
Brian Little's (Aston
Villa) reign at
Hull City is over. Brian was sacked on the last day of
February, he had been in charge for less than two years.
Hull City were at the top end of Division Three, so the
sacking came as a bit of a surprise.
See Hull City Football Club
Toshack Out !
John Toshack (Cardiff
City) has been
sacked by Real Sociedad, the club he took over in January
2001.
BBC SPORT EUROPE
Toshack bids farewell to Sociedad reports
Toshack returned to
Sociedad in January 2001 John Toshack said he will be
with former club Real Sociedad "in spirit"
as they battle to avoid relegation this season.
Toshack was sacked
as coach and general manager of the club on Monday,
after defeat to Tenerife left them second to bottom
of the Spanish first division with nine games left to
play.
"Farewells are
never very pleasant," Toshack told reporters on
Tuesday.
"I'll be
encouraging the players when I say goodbye to them.
"I'll be
wishing them luck, and maybe advising some of them to
concentrate a bit more.
"On Sunday I
won't be with the team in person but I'll be there in
spirit and I hope they can get a good result."
1949: Born in
Cardiff 1966: Joins Cardiff City
1970: Joins Liverpool, wins 3 league
titles, 2 Uefa Cups and 1 FA Cup
1979: Takes Swansea from 4th to 1st
division
1984: Moves to Sporting Lisbon
1985: 1st spell at Real Sociedad
1989: Goes to Real Madrid
1994: Back at Sociedad, takes part-time
role with Wales but resigns after a game
1995: Moves to Deportivo
2000: Given St Etienne job after 2nd
Real Madrid spell ends
2002: Third spell at Sociedad ends
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Toshack began his
third stint as Real Sociedad manager in January 2001
and managed to get the team out of the relegation
places and up to 13th by the end of the season.
"It was a very
tough 15 months," Toshack said. "I was
their fourth coach in 12 months when I arrived last
year so something was not quite right.
"When I
arrived for the first time here (in 1985) I was only
the third coach in 16 years."
The Spanish club
told the Welshman he was being dismissed from both
his roles, coach and 'sporting director', at a board
meeting on Monday evening.
"This is down
to recent results and, above all, is a way of
inspiring an improvement over the last nine games of
the season," Real Sociedad president Jose Luis
Astiazaran said.
"The team have
not been able to beat direct rivals and the calendar
for the remainder of the season is extremely
demanding."
Astiazaran added:
"We were looking for a change. I thank Toshack
for his professional attitude and services to the
club."
This season Toshack
has spent almost $15m on Dutch goalkeeper Sander
Westerveld from his former club Liverpool, Yugoslav
striker Darko Kovacevic and Turkish midfielder Nihat
Kahveci.
But the San
Sebastian side have constantly struggled.
Now Toshack has
gone along with his coaching assistants Salva Iriarte
and Roberto Lopez Ufarte.
Former Sociedad
goalkeeper Roberto Olabe will replace Toshack as
coach, with Jesus Maria Zamora and Julen Masach as
his assistants.
Toshack had two
previous spells at Sociedad - from 1985-89, when the
club won the Copa del Rey, and from 1991-95.
He also twice
coached Real Madrid and has been in charge of Swansea
City, Sporting Lisbon, Deportivo La Coruna, Turkey's
Besiktas, French club Saint-Etienne and had one match
in charge of the Welsh national side.
Walter Smith Out !
Walter Smith (Dundee
United) has
finally been sacked as manager of Everton, after many
months of criticism from Everton fans frustrated at the
club's lack of success in recent years.
Everton have never been
higher than 6th in the Premier League, and have twice
finished in 17th place - the lowest non-relegation
position. Also they have failed to win a competition
since the FA Cup in 1995, or enter Europe since the
ensuing Cup Winners' Cup in 1995-96. As the club has been
in the top Division longer than any club but Arsenal - a
run going back to 1954, talk of relegation is hard for
supporters to bear.
However, Walter had
kept his post for three and a half years mainly because
he has done very well given the club's limited resources.
Financial problems have severely affected the club's
ambitions, and Walter has been credited for making the
best of a bad job.
But last Sunday's 3-0
defeat to Middlesbrough in the FA Cup on national
terrestial television, proved to be the final blow. Even
though the team played poorly for just seven first-half
minutes when they let in all three goals, the subsequent
sacking in the week that followed was a highly
predictable event.
Walter's replacement
has been former-Preston North End's wonder boy, David
Moyes, and he won his first match in charge yesterday to
keep the club in 15th position. With 8 games still to
play Everton have just a 4 point advantage over the 4
teams below them in what promises to be a very tight
relegation battle.
See BBC SPORT EVERTON Everton
move for Moyes
BBC SPORT EVERTON Smith's
Everton years
Computer Management
Two Bob 70-71 Page
players are current stars of computer games. 'Sir Alex
Ferguson's
Player Manager 2002' is due for release on 29 March 2002,
and adverts are already appearing in the press. The game
is available on PC, Playstation and Playstation 2.
Meanwhile, Sven-Göran
Eriksson (Karlskoga) has also been signed up for
two computer games published by Ubisoft. A recent press
release at www.ubisoft.co.uk-pressreleases-Sven.html says:
London, 22nd
February 2002 - Ubi Soft®
Entertainment today announced that it has signed an
exclusive deal with Anco Software to publish Sven
Goran Eriksson games on the PC-CD ROM.
The deal follows on from the recent
agreement between Ubi Soft and Anco to publish Alex
Ferguson’s Player Manager 2002 for the PCCD and
Sony PlayStation.
According to the agreement Ubi Soft
will release Sven Goran Eriksson's World Cup
Manager and Sven Goran Eriksson's World Cup
Challenge in UK, Australia, New Zealand and
Scandinavia.
The Sven games will feature brand new
engines, which will incorporate new stadiums,
enhanced AI and player models.Many of the talented
developers who helped to create the classic Kick Off
series are currently applying their expertise to the
Sven games.
"It just keeps getting better
and better, first Alex Ferguson and now Sven Goran
Eriksson. International football management is
extremely high profile and England love Sven. We will
release 2 games that truly capture the flavour of the
world cup" Saul Leese Marketing Manger Anco
Sven Goran Eriksson's World Cup
Manager and Sven Goran Eriksson's World Cup
Challenge will be available in March 2002.
Sven-Göran's Musical Greats !
There is yet more Sven-Göran
Eriksson (Karlskoga) product available as the World
Cup nears. This report appears at Sven's album - Football365.com
Sven-Goran Eriksson has
chosen the Dambusters March and Rule Britannia for a
new compilation album.
He has also picked Jerusalem
by Sir Hubert Parry for Sven-Goran Eriksson's
Classical Favourites.
The three-CD classical set
will be released in time for the World Cup.
It will feature a mix of
English, Swedish and Italian greats.
The first disc features
works by Elgar, Delius and Purcell, as well as
Jerusalem, the Dambusters March by Eric Coates and
Rule Britannia by Henry Wood.
The second focuses on
European classical selections and the third
concentrates on works by Scandinavian composers.
The album will be released
in the UK on April 12.
See more March 2002 news at the
following ...
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